LoreReads
The books fill in Adam Jensen's years, from Detroit to Prague.
This cyberpunk series follows augmented agents pulling at conspiracies that go all the way up. Ion Storm made the first two games, Deus Ex (2000) and Invisible War (2003), set in the 2050s and 2070s. Eidos Montréal brought the series back with Human Revolution and Mankind Divided, prequels that follow Adam Jensen in 2027 and 2029.
Every book belongs to the Jensen era. James Swallow wrote two novels: Icarus Effect runs alongside Human Revolution with new leads, and Black Light covers the gap between Jensen's two games. Two comic collections add side stories, one set in the middle of Human Revolution and one just before Mankind Divided. The original two games have no tie-in fiction at all.
The order here starts with the 2000 original, because Human Revolution was written for people who'd played it. If a game that old is a hard sell, starting at Human Revolution works fine. It's set 25 years earlier and explains everything you need. Black Light is the one book worth reading even if you skip the rest.
The games go in release order, starting with the 2000 original. Human Revolution and Mankind Divided are prequels, but they were made for people who knew the first game, and they keep winking at it. Every book belongs to the Jensen era, so they all sit between Human Revolution and Mankind Divided: the comic after Human Revolution, then Icarus Effect right before The Fall, which continues it, then Black Light and Children's Crusade leading into Mankind Divided. If you only care about Jensen, start at Human Revolution; the books still make sense.
In 2052 a plague called the Gray Death is killing millions, and the only treatment is in short supply. JC Denton, a new nano-augmented agent with the UN Anti-Terrorist Coalition, is sent after the terrorists stealing shipments of it. The job starts on Liberty Island in New York and keeps raising questions about who UNATCO really answers to.
Twenty years after the original, the world is rebuilding after a global collapse and has split into walled city-states. Alex D, a trainee at the Tarsus Academy in Chicago, survives an attack that levels the city and is moved to Seattle. Before long several factions, the WTO and the Order among them, are trying to pull Alex onto their side, each with its own plan for what comes next.
Detroit, 2027. Adam Jensen runs security at Sarif Industries, a company at the front of the boom in augmentations. When mercenaries storm the labs and leave him close to dead, Jensen is rebuilt with the company's best hardware without anyone asking him. Six months later he's back at work, chasing the people behind the attack from Detroit to the Chinese city of Hengsha.
Already part of the main story in the Director's Cut
Partway through Human Revolution's story, Jensen wakes up in a cell on a cargo ship with his augmentations switched off. This expansion covers the stretch the main game skips over: getting off that ship and through the Belltower base at the other end, mostly without the abilities you'd built up. It's about five hours long.
Somewhere between his work in Detroit and his first trip to Hengsha, Adam Jensen is sent to recover the kidnapped niece of his boss, David Sarif. The job drags up a mystery that goes back to his years on the Detroit police SWAT team, before the augmentations. Collects the six-issue Human Revolution comic series.
This is a side mission slotted into the middle of Human Revolution, with Jensen and Sarif as you know them from the game. The useful part is the look at Jensen's SWAT past, which the game mostly just mentions. The story is rushed and the romance subplot feels forced, which is the common complaint, so treat it as a quick extra rather than something the games need. It's short enough for one evening.
Before The Fall, which continues its story
In 2027, federal agent Anna Kelso keeps pulling at a case her superiors want closed. Ben Saxon, an augmented former soldier working as a private contractor, is recruited into the Tyrants, an elite team for hire. They start on opposite sides of the Atlantic, but the threads they're following lead to the same conspiracy.
Adam Jensen isn't the lead here. Instead you get the Tyrants from the inside, the augmented mercenaries Jensen keeps running into, as a working team with their own habits and rivalries. It also introduces Saxon and Kelso, whose story carries straight on in The Fall, so read it before playing that. It's a fast thriller, heavier on gunfights than on the series' politics, and the new leads take a while to earn your interest. Worth it if the Tyrants left you wanting more, or if you plan to play The Fall.
While Adam Jensen is still recovering from the attack on Sarif Industries, ex-mercenary Ben Saxon and former federal agent Anna Kelso are hiding out in Costa Rica. Both are augmented, and a worldwide shortage of Neuropozyne, the drug that stops their bodies rejecting their implants, is starting to hurt. Saxon heads to Panama City to find a supply.
After the end of Human Revolution, the world blames augmented people for a night of violence, and Adam Jensen has dropped out of sight. He's alive, keeping his head down, and trying to work out who was really responsible. That search pulls him back toward people he used to work with and a conspiracy he'd hoped was finished with him.
If you started Mankind Divided wondering how Jensen got from the end of Human Revolution to a desk at Task Force 29, this is the answer. It covers what happened to him after the first game and ends with Jensen taking the TF29 job he has when Mankind Divided opens. You also get context for the Juggernaut Collective and for how quickly the world turned on augs. Swallow clearly knows these characters, and it's the better of his two Deus Ex novels. Read it between the two games. Of everything here, it's the book Mankind Divided leans on most.
Newly attached to the Prague unit of Interpol's Task Force 29, Adam Jensen goes out on an operation against augmented extremists. It's 2029, augs are blamed for almost everything, and the people he's chasing say they're fighting back. Collects the five-issue Titan Comics series.
A short look at Jensen in his new job with TF29, the unit he works for in Mankind Divided, and at the anger among augs that the game's story is built on. It's a quick read and it doesn't change anything about the game, but it's a decent bridge if you've just finished Black Light and want a bit more before starting Mankind Divided. Skip it if you're short on time.
Prague, 2029, two years after the Aug Incident turned the world against augmented people. Augs carry papers, ride separate trains and are being moved into a walled district called Golem City. Adam Jensen works for Interpol's Task Force 29 while quietly passing information to the hacker group Juggernaut Collective. When a bomb goes off in a Prague train station, he's put on the case.
After the main story
Frank Pritchard, Jensen's old hacker colleague from Sarif Industries, turns up in Prague with a favor to ask: help him break into the Palisade Blade, a vault where some of the world's best-guarded data is kept. A hacker who calls herself Shadowchild is their way in. It's a few hours long and takes you deeper into the Palisade Bank than the main game does.
After the main story, though it's a flashback
In a session with Delara Auzenne, Task Force 29's psychologist, Jensen talks through one of his early TF29 assignments: going undercover in a prison for augmented criminals to reach an agent inside. Most of this DLC is that mission, played as a flashback. It runs a few hours and stands apart from the main plot.
Last reviewed October 11, 2026